A visiting judge apparently will skip a jury trial of some disciplinary charges against local lawyer Theresa Caballero and go straight to the punishment phase.

In a pre-trial letter, Judge George D. Gilles of Midland wrote that he intended to find that during a 2011 trial, Caballero improperly criticized the judge and repeatedly disrupted proceedings. Caballero was convicted of doing those things last summer as part of a criminal-contempt case.

The charges are part of the proceedings brought against Caballero by the Texas State Bar's Commission for Lawyer Discipline. She faces a further charge relating to an attempt to destroy a trial transcript that has been used in her disciplinary cases.

REPORTER

Marty Schladen

Caballero faces a range of punishments, including suspension of her law license or disbarment These more-severe punishments appeared likely in late November when Gilles rejected an agreed settlement between Caballero and the disciplinary commission that would have placed her license on probation for nine months and required her to pay $1,000 in attorney's fees.

Gilles did not say why he was rejecting the settlement. But in a motion to have him removed, Caballero wrote that Gilles' decision implied the proposed punishments "were not sufficient."

She claimed that Gilles further proved he was biased against her because he "granted the (disciplinary commission's) motion for summary judgment thus denying (Caballero) a jury trial in this case and relegating the hearing to a punishment hearing only."

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Caballero couldn't be reached for comment last week. Gilles' office also did not return a call.

Kim Bueno, spokeswoman for the disciplinary commission, said that Gilles wrote a letter a week before Caballero's trial was scheduled to start on Dec. 3.

It said he intended to grant the commission's motion to find Caballero guilty of all the acts the judge in the contempt trial found her guilty of, but it said the commission still had to prove that Caballero participated in an improper effort to destroy the transcript of the 2011 trial in which 448th District Judge Regina Arditti was acquitted of bribery.

Caballero and Stuart Leeds defended Arditti in the bribery case.

Before the trial started, they accused the judge, Steve Smith of College Station, of racism because he sent an email saying hearings would start at 8:30 a.m. even if that was earlier than customary at the El Paso County Courthouse.

Caballero and Leeds claimed this proved Smith was biased against them and their client. As they picked the jury, Caballero showed prospective jurors a drawing of a two-headed monster with one head labeled "judge" and another labeled "DA."

Even after the Arditti trial, Caballero and Leeds pushed their theory that Smith is a racist to media outlets in his home city, to the Texas U.S. Senate delegation and to the government of the Catholic Church in Rome, Italy. They posted the letter they wrote to those people on Caballero's blog.

Smith cited both lawyers with multiple counts of contempt at the end of the Arditti trial.

In the contempt case, held last summer, Visiting Judge Juanita Vasquez-Gardner of San Antonio cited Caballero for telling Arditti's jury panel that the judge and the prosecutor were in cahoots, for arguing "excessively with the rulings of the court when they were not the ones she desired" and for other offenses.

In her written orders, Vasquez-Gardner found that Caballero and Leeds committed "purposeful acts of disrespect and affronts to the dignity and authority of the court; and that said conduct and acts were reasonably calculated to impede, embarrass and/or obstruct the court in the discharge of its duties."

Vasquez-Gardner levied nominal fines against the lawyers, but she probated them. However, the lawyers still faced disciplinary proceedings before the State Bar.

Leeds settled his case in November, accepting a six-month probation of his law license and paying $1,000 in attorney's fees. The settlement came after Leeds successfully removed a judge who rejected the deal, writing that it wasn't severe enough.

Gilles, the judge in Caballero's case, declined her slightly more severe proposed punishment.

In his pre-trial letter, Gilles said his court would not re-litigate the findings of the contempt trial, meaning that all that is left to do with regard to them is determine a punishment -- which is at the sole decision of the judge in disciplinary cases.

Bueno, of the disciplinary commission, said that Gilles intended to enter an order to that effect when he came to El Paso for Caballero's disciplinary trial. But the trial was delayed when Caballero filed her motion to remove Gilles.

In a December hearing on the matter, Caballero questioned Gilles' integrity, implying that he had engaged in improper out-of-court discussions about her.

Yet another visiting judge, Billy Ray Stubblefield of Georgetown, denied Caballero's motion to remove Gilles, saying she had not furnished any evidence that he was biased against her. Her disciplinary trial has not been rescheduled.

Just after the Arditti trial, Leeds sought to get court employees to destroy the transcript even though Judge Smith had ordered that it be preserved for use in disciplinary proceedings against Leeds and Caballero.

The disciplinary commission asked Gilles to rule that Caballero acted improperly in that effort, citing disciplinary rules against obstructing justice. But in his letter, Gilles said he did not intend to grant that motion.

Bueno said she couldn't comment when asked whether the disciplinary commission intended to pursue the charge related to the attempted destruction of the Arditti transcript.